


Fata Morgana (or the teacup that defied time)

by FollowinganImpulse



Category: Hannibal (TV), Killing Eve (TV 2018)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Blood and Gore, Bloody Kisses, Comments are needed to improve, Experiment, Explicit Sexual Content, Heavy Angst, M/M, Multi, This will be short, Ulterior motives from the author, Will figure out as it goes, slowburn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-04
Updated: 2019-05-17
Packaged: 2020-02-18 13:30:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18700573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FollowinganImpulse/pseuds/FollowinganImpulse
Summary: What happened after the Dragon and the cliff.





	1. Darkness and Gold

The hell beneath the waves is a place of dark violence, and to a certain extent Hannibal feels at peace there, in the moments immediately after him and Will come crashing through the steel-like waves beneath the cliff. There is a savage yet inevitable quality to it. It is, after all, the nature of the waves to come crashing down against themselves. There is an echo of this sensation within him, one he experiences most vividly every time he kills not out of necessity, but pleasure, one that lingers within him as he carefully treats and prepares the cuts he has taken from his chosen two-legged swine.

Yet they drown. And as he tries to kick, as the darkness swallows them, he notices the pain, the dullness of his leg, and realizes only the thrill, the fear of the moment, has kept him lucid. A broken leg. Maybe two. I did not take a breath. A foolish thing to forget, but there where more important matters on his mind: angling the fall so that they´d go into the waves feet first, himself before Will so as to give him a better chance.

The darkness is beautiful. The sun is gone and the faint lights his dilated pupils catch beneath the waves give the moment a dreamlike quality, with the darkest shadow of all dragging him to the surface. As the freezing air bites his skin, Hannibal realizes he can´t quite move. He almost feels as if he could choose not to breathe at that moment. But Will´s eyes catch his, searching for life, and that is enough. He breathes. The Will that looks at him is still the one that pushed them down the cliff, the one that killed with him, the one that despite his intentions had hugged him, had admitted the beauty of that last instant with the Dragon.

 _His_ Will, he can´t help but think. The one he always hoped to find.

Relief and content wash over him, and Hannibal can´t help but sink into a darker ocean of unconsciousness. He knows he should try to stay awake, his instincts scream it at him, for he has never been, and probably won´t be again, more vulnerable than he is right now. But with Will at his side, that weakness is nothing to fear.

-

Chiyoh runs.

She had followed them to the cliff-side house, and witnessed it all. Whatever she might have felt as she watched the two men facing the winged devil went up in flames when she saw them tumble into the ocean. And it feels like hours have gone by, but her clock disagrees saying its just been two minutes, as she finally reaches the pier where the motorboat lies. Lady Murasaki always instilled into her a sense of readiness that doesn´t fail her today, as she filled the tank of the boat earlier that same evening as the men settled into the house just in case. The rifle tumbles at her side, and Chiyoh curses and curses and curses, because this is one of the rare situations she´s found herself in when the rifle is useless to her, and it makes her feel open, a rabbit surrounded by wolves. Even when she doesn´t get a chance to use the rifle, like that time against her prisoner back in the Lecter State, knowing that the rifle is there and could be of service is enough to keep her tempered, calm.  
Not here. Not tonight.

This darkness is so different from the woods she has stalked around most of her life. But as the boat rumbles into the water she manages to gain back some clarity, some steel-like calm back, even with her beating heart deafening on her ears and her sweat making her shiver when the cold wind licks it. She needs to calm down if she is going to find them alive. She doesn´t even doubt that she will.

The minutes pass like eons as she squints, looking for something other than the crests of rising and falling water that grow murkier by the minute.

-Hannibal!

Nothing.

-Will!

Her ears pierce through the noise of the water crashing onthe rocks, enough so as to allow her to perceive a far off moan, maybe a voice. Closer to the cliff. A minute later, as she treads carefully to avoid missing anything, the sees a head, far to the right. She curses for not having thought of bringing a searchlight from the pier. But it is Will, and as they grow closer, Hannibal in his stead. The lights on the cliff are enough to see them clearly.

Hannibal is limp as she receives him and cradles him to not let him crash into the bottom of the boat, as she urges him to vomit all the salty water inside his body. For an instant, as she stands, she fantasizes about just getting the motor going, letting Will Graham die as he surely must have been destined to for a long time now. She's sure he's the one that threw them off the cliff. But she remembers a night that seems distant in the past, of Hannibal carrying Will carefully as he treads across the snow from the Verger Mansion, how he trusted her to protect them both without asking for it. And so, she offers Will her hand, pulls him in, because this time it is him carrying Hannibal.

-Thank you -they whisper at the same instant. And then Will collapses.

-

Jack Crawford misses them by a minute. After stabilizing Hannibal´s broken legs, bandaging the bullet wound and most of his other wounds, and securing Will´s shattered ribs, Chiyo tosses them with a bunch of blankets on the inside of the truck she´s been using for the last few months, and then proceeds to speed off across the road, lights off. In the distance, down the highway that intersects with the road she´s in, she sees lights, cars, many of them, and her intuition forces her to veer off the pavement and take cover in the trees, as far as she can manage, and turn the car off.  
71 seconds later, six police cars pass them, followed by two vans filled without a doubt of armed operatives, and among all those must sit Jack Crawford, undoubtedly readying himself to find a scene he's not going to like. A man like that must be used to disappointment. Once they're far enough and she´s made sure Hannibal is still breathing in the back, she takes them off into the night again.

Will has made them as invisible as he can manage, but she can still see them on the rearview mirror. Barely conscious hovering over unconscious, protectively, intimately, beneath the covers, still soaking wet. Once, she might have slept with the brunette, amidst the many times she might have shot him. She's quite sure that she won´t get the chance to do either now. She's not going to kill, or sleep, with Hannibal´s property. Where to, now? Who do they know that might not rat them out, someone she might know of? She could bandage them and do some light surgery, but if Hannibal needs actual help she's going to need help, a lot of it. Or at least, a lot of money.

-

The golden smell of the orange, garlic and parsley sauce seeping into her exquisitely cooked leg has almost lulled Bedelia to sleep when a polite knock at the door assaults her calmness.


	2. Why?

Hannibal sleeps in her bed, both his legs firmly bound and a powerful sedative in his veins. A sleeping beast. Across from the table in the living room, Will Graham breathes slowly, painfully, -smelling, perhaps hungrily, her meat?- eyes closed, and the woman she doesn't know eyes her distrustfully, going back and forth between her and her lushly served leg.

-One would think those on Hannibal's immediate inner circle would deem a cooked human leg proof enough of kinship. 

The woman purses her lips, and Bedelia blinks.

-Or at the very least an acceptable degree of moral corruption. Apologies. I should not make assumptions about anyone’s palate.

-Offense non-taken.

-I really don’t mean to be rude. But you know they’ll be coming here soon.

This time Bedelia speaks to Will, who opens his eyes. He is badly hurt, she can see that, but his eyes are as steely as ever.

-I know. I wonder what will Jack say of your… -he examines the cooked leg and then closes his eyes again -...choice of dinner.

-May I ask… who tried to kill who?

-The Dragon.

Enough of an answer. Barely.

-I guess Jack's plan to weed out the Fairy worked. In a fashion.

-My plan.

-I thought your plan was to kill Hannibal, Will. Although, that might be my mistake. You did not specify if you would kill him right away. 

-Who says I didn’t try?

Will’s words make Bedelia smile.

-Hannibal is in my bed, breathing. I think you might have thought you wanted to murder him, truly. But if I recall correctly, you have killed completely before, Will.

-He’s not an easy man to kill.

-Especially for you, I might add. But then again, courtship comes in many flavours.

Bedelia isn’t sure, but the rifle woman seems to be trying to repress a teeny tiny smile.

-What are you going to do now? Where will you go?

-I… I don´t know.

Bedelia feels amusement, but also a certain sadness.

-You should be on your way nonetheless.

-So you won’t help us, then.

-Money I can give. But I just lost a limb very recently, Will.

-I wouldn’t exactly say lost, Bedelia -says Will, picking a cherry tomato close to her ankle. He doesn’t eat it.

-You have multiple cuts, a mild concussion and six broken ribs. Hannibal could bleed out any minute from that gunshot wound, has a badly bruised ankle, a broken leg and severe stab wounds. Forgive me if I think you are in a hurry, but since you can’t go to a hospital you should really be considering help other than me.

-Any ideas, then? Any doctor you might know who can be persuaded to treat a cannibal?

-An idea, yes. What if you left him here?

The room freezes. The woman is suddenly on her feet, her rifle still on her shoulder but grabbed tightly, and at first Bedelia thinks the silent warning is aimed towards her. But no. It’s a warning for Will. And even so, Bedelia must continue.

-The Dragon is dead. You and Hannibal are not, but he could die soon. And you don’t want him to. Not, at least, like this.

The woman cocks her rifle, almost absent-mindedly. Will jumps, but Bedelia sew her leg off earlier this evening. She doesn’t even stutter.

-I assure you Jack Crawford wouldn’t want either of you dead. He would not let you.

-He won’t go back in a cage.

-Will, Hannibal is sedated. You can put him wherever you like. The only difference is that if you don't hurry he won’t be breathing when he’s put in his box.

-I won’t go back to jail. We both know I’ve been crazy before, and Jack won’t buy it twice. 

-Funny. I don’t recall telling you to turn yourself in.

But it's all just inconsequential words now, she knows it. It isn’t because the woman is holding her rifle ready to end them should they come to a disagreeable decision. It is because Bedelia suddenly realizes Will only considers viable the alternatives that will allow him to stay with Hannibal: turning him in would mean going in himself. Bedelia has to contain a fit of laughter. Will Graham. The Romantic.  
Slowly, she serves herself onto her dish. The knife rattles lightly against the plate as she cuts. Will Graham´s eyes are on her lips when she takes a bite, the flavour filled with a sense of bewilderment, arousal and nausea that makes her tense allover.

-I´d offer some so you can feed him on the way. But Hannibal likes his food warm.

-Why, Bedelia?

As if he needed to clarify, Will gestures to her meat, to her still grinding teeth.

-Could you answer why you do anything for him, Will?

SIlence.

-Why are any of us here? We might invent hows and give ourselves as many reasons and excuses as we want, fear, love, survival, but the answer to the why is simple enough: Hannibal Lecter. If I´m not mistaken, you have a wife, a child. Don´t you, Will?

Hate in his eyes. Bedelia smiles gently.

-I won't presume to know if you love her or you don´t. But why, Will? Why did you even try? Did you actually think you would get away from this, from him?

Another bite, with a small side of cherry tomatoes and butter-fried almonds.

-Ever since I glimpsed the thing beneath his human mask I've known it. Maybe you two also have. We are already on his plate. We are just waiting to be prepared gloriously, but we lost any and all chance of escaping the moment we became of interest to him. This... -her stump tingles and bleeds as she squirms - ...this felt fitting. A fitting goodbye, if by some strike of destiny he did die tonight. But alas.

The three of them look at the room, where a light breathing continues unperturbed. The woman lowers the rifle and whispers:

-We should go, Will.

Her voice is soft, without accent, automatic. Bedelia can't help but stare. She's beautiful.

-There's a wheelchair in the back. I was planning on using it, but I can always get a new one.

The woman walks quickly, and disappears.

-You should go north. Europe, if you can manage so far. I have a couple of thousand dollars I can spare on the lower cabinet of the study closet.

Will doesn´t move.

-Want a bite?

-I might have to decline, Bedelia.

-They´ll call you murder husbands.

That gets a reaction. Freddy Lounds and her tackiness leave no soul unperturbed.

-Take care of him, Will. Or kill him, if you can.

-Take care, Bedelia.

-

Jack Crawford arrives an hour after they're gone. Bedelia would´ve asked Chiyoh to hit her to make it look like they broke in, but the matter of her cooked leg is notably harder to explain, so they take it with them and throw it away several hours later on a river. She can pin the missing limb on them. There's no easy way to explain the smell, but Chiyoh and Will have washed what they could. A messy crime scene, all with Hannibal´s DNA in the sheets Will diligently put in the washer, but she can always claim shock when it comes to the messy, vague answers she gives the police.  
That night, as she tries to sleep in the hospital aided by a wonderful cocktail of drugs, Bedelia wonders if Will might have wanted to try her leg along the way. He doesn't, but she can't possibly know that, and so she wonders. Maybe he will. Maybe he will while they drive away, with her leg wrapped in cellophane paper, and with the blood and honey on his lips he might kiss Hannibal, maybe not even that, just come closer to his nose, enough so that he might smell her. More than any other, Hannibal´s brain is hardwired to that sense. Will he, in the darkness of his dreams, recognize her?  


Why does the idea wet her and terrify her at the same time?  


Why?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah. Second one on the same day because... yeah. Why?  
> I like Bedelia du Maurier. And not just because of Gillian Anderson.


	3. Killer´s delights, killer´s tears.

Back in Lithuania, in the years in between Mischa’s death and Will’s arrival, Chiyoh had found some semblance of who she was. A hunter. A scarred woman. A creature of habits. The loneliness that surrounded the Lecter estate was often mistook for a bleak, haunted aura. But she knew better, because in the days and nights, in the mist and the bird’s feather and the foxe`s fur she had found she felt no pleasure in the kill, but in the thrill right before. She was a hunter. Not whatever the Lecter’s had been, not what lady Murasaki had shaped her to be. The caged man reminded her day after day of what she wasn’t, of what she could but didn’t do to him, and she would have thanked her fo it were he not a monster of the past.

Bedelia du Maurier’s words had cut deep. “We are just waiting to be prepared gloriously, but we lost any and all chance of escaping the moment we became of interest to him”. Had there ever been such time, for her? To what extent was she really herself, and not just the product of the household she had grown in, of the monster in a man's costume? Because, indeed, just in the same way Will Graham seemed bound to Hannibal by something that would not let him go, just the same she had protected them, time and time again, a hunter on a leash.

Whatever the case, Chiyoh still hits herself hard enough, so that her lip splits and bleeds, but just enough so as not to really hurt herself. She waits as the pain grows, as the lips gets swollen, and she allows the tears to trail down her cheeks for dramatic effect. There are other methods she could use, but Hannibal is almost the colour of wax and Will is dizzy and pale. They need the blood. And just like that she marches into the hospital, hood up, trying her best to avoid the cameras.

Blood. A hound looking for blood.

She always cooks the meat to leather-like consistency to distance herself, even on her own, from Hannibal’s memory. From Mischa. But tonight, Hannibal’s presence is all around her, as she fails to gain access to the blood bank, as she steals medical supplies, as she realizes every minute counts. Who she is, the woman that grew into herself in the lithuanian forests, is still a puppet to the doctor’s necessities.

It’s this spirit that ultimately allows her to find the blood, type O, albeit still beating within the heart of a young man who exits beside a nurse who reminds him not to take the little band-aid off until a few hours later, not to donate blood again in the next 3 months, and to eat something sugary before heading back home. She might be a hunter. But it’s Hannibal who enjoys the killing of his kin, who eats out of spite, and it’s that intent that she taps into when ten minutes later she drives away with the boy unconscious in the back. It’s easy. She’s Hannibal’s, he is already inside her, eating away at the little Chiyoh she thinks she is.

A nameless boy. Back in the cold forest she hangs him by his feet, extracting every bit of blood from him and fills Will and Hannibal with it. In the darkness she hides him once he´s grown cold, far off from any trails that might attract hikers. Lady Murasaki taught her how to hide the carcasses well. 

Will lives. The nameless boy doesn’t. And even if Hannibal’s heart had stopped, he would still live inside her, a cancer, a rust.

Or even worst: like he is an actual part of her.

-

Hannibal wakes up to the pain. But he's never been one to show what he won´t will, and so he only opens his eyes and cocks his head to the side, assessing the world around him.  
The light from the lampposts trickles through the blinds into the motel room. In the air, Chiyoh, but in the past, not there. She´s gone, but her rifle is there, tipped against the bedside table. Hannibal looks to the other side, knowing full well what he'll find, but still deliciously aroused when he sees Will sharing his pillow. Maybe this is all the other people crave when they think of love: to share a space as intimately as they do right now. But not Hannibal. What excites him the most is the memory of the Dragon, of the blood spilling from his, their wounds, and seeing the bruises on Will´s skin, so close, so tender. Real.

A week has gone by. 

Chiyoh brings food, supplies, and news. The Verger’s have fled overseas. Crawford has a nation-wide arrest order in place for them, and Tattle Crime´s “Murder Husband´s honeymoon getaway: slaying the Fairy” slew of articles and associated merch have blown up like a rotten egg. Hannibal develops a mild infection that makes him feverish during the day, and in return leaves him sleepless at night. It's then that Hannibal gets closer to Will, who sleeps by his side, and smells him, pretending they're alone and marvelling at how his mind races between the glorious dishes he wants to turn the man into and the sensual, sexual urges that stir his loins. They've only been so close in two previous occasions: once in Hannibal's kitchen, before the teacup they were together shattered as he gutted Will and killed Abigail, and then again on the cliffside, Francis Dolarhyde bleeding to death by them and both men holding each other, Will finally confessing the rightness of the moment, the beauty. Both times covered in slaughter and passion, and now… this. Nights of this. Of sweet, sweet aftermath. The broken bones and sprained ankle, the gunshot wound and the hematomas, are nothing but a just, fair price for these hours of darkness and Will´s smell, intoxicating Hannibal´s senses like the idea of him has for years.

Hannibal is in pain most of the time they're in the car, but they can't travel as often as they want, both because of Hannibal´s wounds and the pesky FBI raids that go off left and right. Hannibal has a feeling he might need a dentist soon, because of how often he finds himself grinding his molars against the indignity of it all, the utter lack of independence he is subjected to. It forces his and Will´s personal spaces together, though, and Hannibal has always had a fascination for such invasions. It always comes to a head when they can't put off bathing him, or helping him to the bathroom. Chiyoh would do it without doubt, but Will always takes the lead, and Hannibal stares as both men struggle to undress him, to wash, to pretend like the niceties of society they´ve left behind are still there while they sit on the toilet or the shower, in their underwear, avoiding eye contact and stiff as planks. Hannibal marvels at how much it entices him, for he holds sacred etiquette over any other bible, yet this sinful lack of ways and manners fascinates him.

They don't talk for a very long time, while this episodes happen. Until one day, when it starts to get comfortable, Hannibal decides to shake that up.

-I´m happy you didn´t let me drown.

The water pours onto them for a while, both men silent.

-I don´t know why I didn´t.

-I´m happy you don´t.

Tentatively, Hannibal relaxes, bit by bit as he cleans his body of sweat and scabs, until his back, his head, rests on Wills chest. The ex FBI counselor tenses for a very long moment.

-I have to admit, doctor Lecter, that you seem far more comfortable with all this than I thought you would.

-I might be at my element among the refined and the expensive, Will, but I´m finding all this can be tolerable with… -he looks at Will. Their eyes meet, their bodies warm against one another, both suddenly hyper aware of each other. A small smile forms on Hannibal´s lips at Will´s microexpressions of flustering -...with a good friend.

-...I can´t imagine you´ve had many of those.

-It is amusing. Back in Florence, I used to wash Bedelia sometimes.

Will can´t quite suppress his astonishment, and this time Hannibal smiles broadly as he nuzzles into his chest and perceives the shiver in response.

-She has a beautiful hair. It reminded me of Mischa.

-She cooked herself for you.

Hannibal rises an eyebrow. He did notice a sweet, strangely familiar smell on the car when he first woke up that first night after the Dragon´s death.

-She made an effort for you.

-Shame. It saddens me I wasn't able to partake. How was her taste?

-I´ve told you. It's not my appetite.

-Oh, Will. Manners. We don't reject a lady when she offers herself like that! She must have done her best; one would do so, cooking their own meat. I wonder if she used the garlic recipe I once suggested.

The water stops. Will helps Hannibal to his feet, and they dry carefully. Hannibal can't reach his legs because of the bullet wound, and Will kneels. Hannibal is almost giddy everytime it happens, even if his face is made of stone. But this time, Will stops and looks up. His eyes glean in the bathroom white light.

-I wanted to kill you. On the cliffside.

-I know. 

Hannibal is suddenly very aware of the very real danger of getting hard in the position they´re in.

-Why did you save me, then?

-I wanted to kill you. But… I couldn't just let you die. Not… not like that.

-You´d much rather kill me yourself.

Will stands. Both are covered in scars. Tentatively, Hannibal raises a hand. Will doesn't flinch when the cannibal's hands touch the long, irregular cut on his abdomen, the one so long ago he opened himself.

-I don´t know.

-That's a good answer. Pure potential.

-You would like me to kill you. Wouldn't you, Hannibal?

Hannibal caresses Will´s scars. He's hard now, both know it. They don't say anything else as they dress him in everyman clothes. Hannibal likes being uncomfortable around Will almost as much as making him uncomfortable. He´s, in many ways, at his mercy. Will could leave him there to fend off by himself, kill him, kiss him. And for the first time in his life, Hannibal begins to wonder whether the careful control he´s molded his life around could give enough way for this, for a degree of instability, for Will to be able to seize him when he wants. Hard. Very hard. 

-

Even if the cameras show her face, she made sure no one saw the nameless boy and her closer than usual at any point when they were in the hospital. She repeats this to herself until she's numb, until she finally accepts that she´s not worried she´ll be caught. No. It's about the others. 

She is one of those others. When Mischa died, when Hannibal told her the man in the cage had been the one to murder his sister, to eat her, she became one of the others that did not die but grieved, and for all the years since, she`s stayed one of those others. 

The men she had killed to protect Hannibal were one thing. The nameless boy another entirely, one that hangs over her everytime she goes outside and sees the news about the disappearance of one Greg Matheson, age 18, how the police hasn't found any clues about whether he's been abducted, murdered, nothing, how her mother slowly withers away, day after day in the interviews, and his father becomes less and less expressive, dead on the inside. 

Murderer. You fucking murderer. Lady Murasaki would be proud of her. Hannibal too. Chiyoh thinks of the man in the cage and wonders if he ever regretted killing Mischa, eating her flesh, if, as Will pointed out, that was ever true. The violence she has dispensed on this world is not one that she can accept. Hannibal has most certainly never felt this way. Maybe Will did, at some point. What did he regret? Does he regret anything now, has he gotten close enough to Hannibal to lose himself yet again? She's read up on them, she knows that Will is just a susceptible to him as everyone else. Does he remember his wife, the child and the dogs he's left behind? Does he care? Did he ever?

She cleans the two, she feeds them, loathing herself all the way through. Slowly, they make their way to New York, where they take a third-rate ship across the ocean, carefully disguised as a japanese business woman, her brunette husband and their old, bearded, wounded relative who by this point moves carefully on crutches. Bedelia´s money only gets them so far before they have to tap into Hannibal's stash of illegal bank accounts, always a risk considering how long they've been stale and the FBI, who continue the manhunt over the whole country, who might have picked up on them since Hannibal´s stay at Baltimore´s State Hospital for the Criminally Insane.

Greg Matheson was a good boy. Of the many pictures Chiyoh sees of his symbolic funeral, she ponders the most over the one of his family and a couple of friends crying. He wanted to be an engineer, had already bought a small room in an apartment with his buds near Seattle and had begun to move. He was the kind of kid who went once or twice a year to the hospital to donate blood just because. Healthy. By all accounts nice, even if all dead are saints once they're buried, according to their families. Chiyoh obsesses over such details as the case goes cold, because the nameless boy must have fallen to rot and scavengers, hidden in the trees. 

She, however, can't bring herself to name him. To her, Greg Matheson is a stump name. To her, he's the nameless boy, and will stay that way for quite a while, because it´s easier to sleep with a nameless murder on her hands than that of the good, sweet Greg Matheson. He didn't suffer, at the very least, even if his mother, his father, and his friends do. Chiyoh never killed like this. And yet she did now, for Hannibal, who still treats her as he always has, patronizing and respectful at the same time. There is no contempt on his part when he notices her grief, but no sympathy either. Will makes no effort to get close to her. They´ve grown used to each other, but not close, probably because he still remembers being pushed off the train. 

Even her rifle has been hidden in the luggage, her only comfort gone. If Mischa could see her today, if she could see what dear Chiyoh has done, she`d cry. And so, a couple of months after touching land, settled into two enormous apartments in a small french town, she drops an anonymous tip to the FBI, about a body she's just discovered in the woods, and cuts the call quickly before the voice on the other side can start asking questions.

Chiyoh bites her lip, the scar on it, until there's blood. But not even then can she bring herself to tears.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next week, Alana crashes into Killing Eve´s second season


	4. There (Will) and back again (Eve)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alana is having flashbacks. Jack cared for Will. Can the same be said of Carolyn?

Everytime Margot has to travel to the US, Alana gets sick. Her stomach cramps are violent and unrelenting for days and days until the plane touches down at Heathrow, and Alana unclenches only when she hugs her and accepts that, again, they´ve been lucky. It doesn't matter how much security the Verger´s procure, how secretive they might be about their travelling schedules. Alana still remembers how easy it was for her to track down Hannibal all the way back to Florence using only tartufi bianchi and Batard Montrachet. Easy. Too easy. 

Morgan hates London at first, but slowly, as he begins to get used to the buses and the food, he begins to smile more. The school is ok, he makes friends quickly. It calms her to see how maleable the life of her child is, how easily he adjusts to the new life they’ve been forced to accept. Alana, on the other hand, is ill at ease with her future. Aloof in a foreign country, Alana finds herself stuck in the ample apartment they´ve bought in a quiet, private street in Belgravia, not knowing what to busy herself with other than obsessively reading and re reading the files she compiled on Hannibal, the notes she’s made on Will, reading every email, every report from the FBI, wondering, fearing, because Hannibal is still out there. Will is still out there. Jack Crawford is not answering her calls. Margot is busy reallocating the business so that she can manage it from the United Kingdom, Morgan is busy growing up. Alana is utterly alone.

She only has one conversation with Hannibal's psychiatrist-hostage-fake wife, Bedelia du Maurier. Even on the phone, Alana feels an instant uneasiness at her soothing, calm, piercing voice. It doesn't help that Bedelia refuses almost completely to talk about her encounter with Hannibal and Will, even though her missing leg has become prime meat for the tabloids for weeks and weeks without end. She is, instead, far more interested in her relationship to Hannibal, both professionally and biblically. Victim or not, Alana doesn’t trust Bedelia. 

There was a time, as her hips healed and she recounted to herself every single conversation she had had with Hannibal, when she did not trust herself either. It was only as Hannibal’s ward that she had understood she had begun seeing te worst in people, especially in those that had at one point or another sat at Hannibal’s table. Besides, Bedelia is just plain weird. She jumps from offering her to find new jobs in London to asking if she still eats meat, wether she really loves Margot to if she wants one of TattleCrime’s array of bland merchandise. The conversation is long and tedious. Both women are far too intelligent to let the other have any drop of information without measuring it first, but they nonetheless find in each other an enigma, someone that has had contact with a certain murderer enough so as to be careful to even breath too hard, to reveal anything other than cold courtesy. 

She eventually finds herself her own psychiatrist, a chubby, hairy man called Patrick Jones who treats police and military, and who is specialized in PTSD and survivor-trauma. She is depressed, but works through it, and eventually it´s Patrick who urges her to find a job in the UK since she is not going back to the US anytime soon. The cure must come from within the person, she thinks, as she gets in contact with british officials and secretaries of various agencies who assess her talents and background with a certain degree of fascination. She is, after all, a name known by those in the world of criminology. One day, as Alana drops Morgan at school, an unknown number pops up on her phone.

-Hello?

-Doctor Alana Bloom? 

The woman on the other side of the phone is british, unknown, and with a very posh accent.

-Her speaking. Who am I talking to?

-Carolyn Martens, MI6. I just went through your file, referred to me by a colleague in the police department. I´d like to interview you for a temporary position with me, if you are interested.

Alana blinks. Carolyn quickly arranges for a car to bring her to her office, although Alana is unnerved by how Carolyn doesn´t even bothering asking for her address to send the car. Carolyn´s office is not on the riverside MI6 building but on a fancy, ugly, red construction across the street from Buckingham palace; the office is impressive, all straight lines and glass walls, but Alana finds it far more interesting that Carolyn´s office is laced with a light but noticeable screen of dust all over. Her office is clearly not something she uses often, if ever. She's also one of those people that has enough power and has had it for long enough to walk through life like a train, a menacing straight line that you can hop on into for a time but that will trample and crush you if you try to stop it. Also, she uses first names.

-So, Alana, I take it you´ve recently stepped down officially as chief administrator of Baltimore´s State hospital.

-It’s been a few months, yes.

-You haven't worked for six months. With credentials like yours you could have gotten a job with us since your very first day here. Why didn't you?

I was hoping my life would go back to normal, she would like to say. But this is a work interview, and she´s no amateur.

-I wasn't planning on relocating to the UK so definitively.

-I´ve been in contact with mister Jones. Just wanted to check you are actually fit for duty. I hope you don't mind.

Alana doesn't show her annoyance, because Carolyn clearly doesn't give two shits about whether she minds or not.

-But back to business. I would like to hire you temporarily as an external consultant and profiler in a couple of cases I´ve been working on. You will be paid handsomely. However, I have been told by your lawyer that you require armed guards with you at all times. Why is that?

-My position as wife of the head of the Verger businesses makes me a target. But I can di without them.

She will not let Hannibal into this conversation any further. She knows she looks like a lunatic with the guards, but it does make her feel safe, and Margot is more than happy to provide such comforts to her. But she does need to work.

-What would the position entail?

-Consultation here in London to a couple of investigations, although there is a possibility you might be required to travel. Mostly across Europe. I can not disclose any more details until you…

-I´d be glad to help -she interrupts. Carolyn smiles.

-

-Alana, this is Eve Polastri.

The woman has black hair like a lion and smiles as they shake hands. Alana notices a healing cut on her lower lip.

-Eve, Alana will be serving as profiler and consultor for you and your team should you need her, starting tomorrow. Could you bring her up to speed quickly? I want to buy her a pint. Give me a call once you are done.

Both Alana and Eve raise an eyebrow as Carolyn walks away. A young guy peeks over his laptop.

-That’s Hugo.

Hugo eats Alana up, looking her up and down. The woman finds herself wondering if she is supposed to feel pretty, or just plain uncomfortable. Eve clears her throat so hard they both jump.

-Anyway. My other colleague is in Amsterdam chasing a lead. Bring over her chair. Sorry about him.

-Bit of a horndog, I sense.

-Bit of an idiot.

Both smile. They like each other. Slowly, Eve Polastri introduces Alana to the Ghost´s string of murders, as well as those of an Oksana Asthankova, codename Villanelle, both working as assassins for an obscure organization known only as The Twelve. As they go through the pictures, Alana begins to feel a certain disquiet about Eve. She's clearly professional, astute and knows exactly what things to accentuate and underline to make things clearer. But there is a distinct difference between her involvement with both cases that has nothing to do with how close she might or might not be to solving them: while the Ghost seems to be a mystery she is trying to crack, with all the associated anxieties of piling up murders, there is something else when it comes to Villanelle. 

Something very, very much like Will Graham´s unnerving connection to Hannibal.

-I should add that Villanelle is no amateur, even if some of her kills suggest a certain lack of control. I assure you, it´s all very much intentional, rational, even if she takes pleasure in it. If she can make the murder personal, she will. For example, this man, Julien, was stabbed in the neck, but that wasn´t enough for her. He did something to her. Hence… the toilet brush in his mouth. Killing, for her, is a passion, not just a job. It´s an interaction that is normal to her, much like a smile or inviting someone for a cup of coffee. She relates to others by murder, big gestures that allow her to show who she is to the world.

Eve suddenly realizes she´s ranting, that her heart is running high, and that the woman across from her is staring, so she scrambles to appear at ease and smiles softly. Alana, nonetheless, already has mixed feelings about all this. Not only is Eve as magnetic as Will, but this Oksana, Villanelle, has a flare for the dramatic much like Hannibal´s, albeit far less ruled by the constraints and demands of good taste and more by the sheer thrill of killing in a personal, satisfying manner. 

Is it a coincidence?

-The elevator murder would seem oddly out of character. Why did you pin it on Villanelle and not the Ghost?

Eve bites her lip, unconsciously. Alana doesn’t miss how she licks the wound absent-mindedly.

-I think it was made to look like it was the Ghost’s work. But it’s too over the top for her.

Eve does her best to distract her, thinking of the dangerous lipstick on her pocket. But Alana is quite distracted on her own, having an awful sense of dejá vú.

-

Carolyn and Alana sit in a pub close to Victoria Station, in complete and utter silence. Carolyn seems pretty content with her pint of Lager, almost as if she were drinking on her own, but Alana is too sunken in her own thoughts to acknowledge the awkwardness of the situation.

-I told you I was going to need you on a couple of investigations, Alana. But I didn't tell you which ones.

Alana blinks, focusing.

-I take it it's not just about Villanelle and the Ghost.

-I´m afraid not. Apologies in advance for this, but… I´ve been doing some reading about you. Specifically about your relationship to a certain… doctor. And the agent who disappeared.

-An unfortunate pair of connections in my life.

-A fascinating pair, dare I say.

Alana grinds her teeth, but says nothing to that and drinks.

-You´ve been on my radar for a while, Alana. A certain friend of mine even recommended you before you even sent your CV. You are quite a gifted woman.

-May I ask who?

-Oh, don´t pay attention to that. Here's the thing: you were one of the very few people who had the most contact with doctor Lecter both in and outside the State Hospital, as everyone knows. But I´ve been told you also had a close relationship with one Will Graham. Am I wrong?

Suddenly, Alana´s gears stop dead in their tracks. Carolyn is an enigma, one she's starting to like less and less. Jack Crawford, at least, was straightforward when it came to his intrigues and suspicions, or as straightforward as an FBI mannequin could have ever been. But Carolyn is another matter entirely.

-You don't really care about my consultation in the Ghost and Villanelle´s cases, do you?

Carolyn stops for an instant with the pint on her lips. Alana wonders if she's actually surprised.

-My interests are elsewhere, yes. Eve has wonderful instincts when it comes to these killers, and I'm confident she will be catching the Ghost soon.

-You want me to watch agent Polastri.

-Minds like Graham´s and Eve´s are drawn to these people like flies to honey. And while you might have not had the chance to save your friend from the doctors… urges, I would like you to try with Eve.

-Carolyn, cut the bullshit.

Raised eyebrows, glasses on the table.

-You want to catch Villanelle. You don't care about agent Polastri.

She might be about to botch a great job offer, but this is a subject that hits Alana too close for comfort. Carolyn doesn’t say anything for a while.

-On a personal level I find Eve to be a very reliable, interesting woman. If possible, I would like to catch Villanelle without it costing her what it cost Will Graham. I want you to asses her, to watch her. I´ll give you agents and funding to follow her covertly, and you´ll report directly to me if you think there might be a chance of getting Villanelle into custody with Eve´s help.

-Using her as bait, you mean.

-I´m a good fisher. 

-So is Jack Crawford. And even so, Will is gone. With Hannibal.

-Let’s hope it won’t come to that again. Are you having second thoughts?

Hell yeah she is. But she’s worked through hard choices and against her will before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I was planning on doing this fic completely canon adjacent to KE´s second season. But I´m not liking this season. So from next week well begin to diverge a little.  
> Life´s got me by the balls, so next week, it will be short.

**Author's Note:**

> So... this is my second fic (I killed the first one because I ended up hating all about it), and this time the impulse is not just about writing the story.  
> I am about to go head-first into a Creative Writing MA for a year. FUN! But. I´m a spanish speaker, and I need to get used to writing in english. This is going to be my training about writing in english. And you, dear reader, if you so wish, have the time and/or are bored enough, can help me improve. I don´t mean correct my spelling (GAWD KNOWS I HAVE TO IMPROVE DAT SHIT ON MA OWN) but more as in tell me which phrases read funny, what doesn´t quite make sense, what you think of the content and the characters, and plainly just everything you think about it. Also, if you feel I don´t do something that makes sense (apart from, you know, fanfic standard moves like making Villanelle the dom and Hannibal the sub in a Master/RubberSlave relationship with a bit of Will and Eve tied up on the side (okay, bad joke, but I do want to try my hand at some erotic stuff (seriously, though, Hannibal is a goddam cannibal and I´m sexualizing him at one point or another because... yeah (whew, that´s a lot of ()))) feel free to tell me what you would´ve done. That said, I am going to stand by my some of my desitions (decisions? decitions? Lord I need a Thesaurus) just because I really like slow burn stories and I´m not going to jump right into the smut and gore that will inevitably cover your screen if you, by some miracle, decide to read me to the end.
> 
> I know not how long this will last (I want to make it a 9 part story but once Killing Eve gets kicked into the story this will get messy), but I will try to make it interesting and nice to read. I´ve never done serialized stories or anything, just short stories, so maybe this will all just be a mess, but maybe not. I´ll try to upload once a week (they´re going to be short, I´m afraid, I write on the bus), because I´m a busy guy and because the actual original book I´m writing needs to be done before september and HELL THIS SHIT IS HARD.
> 
> So. Yeah. MUAH.


End file.
